


Hugs

by Archadian_Skies



Series: keeping your head up [6]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Connor & Upgraded Connor | RK900 are Siblings, Father-Son Relationship, Found Family, Gen, Good Parent Hank Anderson, Grief/Mourning, Hugs, Post-Pacifist Best Ending (Detroit: Become Human), Self-Reflection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-07-04
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:47:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25068640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Archadian_Skies/pseuds/Archadian_Skies
Summary: Humans are soft; humans are skin stretched over fat and muscle, with a certain give to them. Androids are solid, they do not have a certain give to them; androids are dermal nano liquid spread over a carbon fibre-reinforced polymer base. There is no softness, no cushioning between the layer of simulated skin and hard plastic casing.Connor is not a domestic model, he was certainly not crafted to be held. He wishes he were, though.
Relationships: Hank Anderson & Connor, Hank Anderson & Connor & Upgraded Connor | RK900
Series: keeping your head up [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1720468
Comments: 9
Kudos: 132





	Hugs

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Detroit: Become Family event on tumblr (dbh-found-family)  
> Threaded into a series but can be read as a standalone

Humans are soft; humans are skin stretched over fat and muscle, with a certain  _ give _ to them. Androids are solid, they do not have a certain give to them; androids are dermal nano liquid spread over a carbon fibre-reinforced polymer base. There is no softness, no cushioning between the layer of simulated skin and hard plastic casing. Dermal nano liquid uses nanoparticles in a silicone suspension that change property when electrical currents are run through them at different voltages; the higher or lower the voltage, the harder or softer the nanoparticles bind, allowing the different textures of their skin and hair to be achieved. It bypasses both the need for a permanent solid synthetic coating, creating a better illusion of skin, and the expensive, wasteful need for wigs. 

The branch of domestic models programmed to care for children have a thicker dermal nano liquid to simulate a little give to them, so when children embrace them they don’t feel so uncomfortable to hold. Connor is not a domestic model, he was certainly not crafted to be held. He wishes he were, though. 

On that cold morning, hours after they won their freedom, Connor had approached Hank at the Chicken Feed. There were far too many things racing through his head as he tried to process it all, but the one thing he remembers so clearly was how soft Hank was when he mimicked his embrace. Connor had never been held before, had never known what it was to wrap his arms around someone else and squeeze gently as a sign of affection. Hank had cupped his nape and guided him to rest his cheek on his shoulder as he slid an arm around him and Connor knew the definition of ‘embrace’ but it was an altogether entirely different matter to experience it. 

Everything he did had been but a mirror to Hank’s actions, everything from the brief, hesitant smile to the tight lingering hug. It was a whole slew of firsts, one after the other, starting from his moment of deviation when he lowered the gun pointed at Markus RK200 all the way to wrapping his arms around Hank and applying the same gentle pressure Hank applied to him. 

“Let’s go home, son.” He’d said, and Connor can replay that memory with perfect clarity- an unrivaled advantage of being an android. After that first embrace, Hank has embraced him a further three times: once when Connor legally became Connor Anderson after the passing of the Sentient Life Act, again when he legally became Detective Connor Anderson with the DPD, and then on Christmas Day after exchanging gifts. Connor has come to the conclusion he quite likes hugs; they are a tangible expression of empathy.

Aside from Hank, Connor has received hugs from other androids too. He has received an embrace from each of the Jericho Four at different times for different reasons. Markus Manfred likes to greet him with hugs, treating him like a half-brother since they are both RK units. Simon PL600 offers hugs out of comfort, soothing Connor when he brings news of a difficult case. Josh PJ500 has hugged him twice now, both times to reassure him he is not to be held accountable for all his actions before his deviation when Connor aided Josh with the memorial for their fallen. North WR400 has hugged him only once, and it had been more of a leap from behind that turned into him giving her a piggyback across the main thoroughfare on his first visit to Jericho. 

It does not come easily to him, though. Connor has never instigated a hug, hasn’t the slightest clue when it would be appropriate to initiate one and how he would even go about signaling his intent. He wishes it came naturally to him, wishes it were programmed into him so he can offer hugs as freely as the Jericho Four offer hugs to him. He wishes his social programming covered interacting with children rather than just adults, because there have been many a lost child dropped off at the precinct with high stress levels that could, he hazards a guess, be quite receptive to hugs. 

Humans need to be held; it is a scientific fact that humans thrive on touch. Connor is the most advanced prototype ever made, and deviant or not he still strives to learn and adapt to his situation and surroundings. Therefore he must practice initiating hugs with the one human in his personal life; Lieutenant Hank Anderson. 

“Hank.” It’s a cold January morning and that adds another layer, another possible excuse, to Connor’s request. “May I give you a hug?”

His father looks across the breakfast counter at him, coffee mug in hand, brow cocked. There’s an uncomfortable stretch of silence and Connor feels his stress level rise.

“I should state that you should not feel pressured to give consent just because you are a family member.” Connor says hastily, deciding to just abort the mission altogether. “I am merely asking bec-”

“C’mere kid.” Hank huffs a laugh, putting his mug down and holding out his arms, making a beckoning gesture with his hands. Connor rounds the counter and slots himself into his embrace, squeezing gently. 

“I saw you hug Samuel Barlett yesterday to comfort him and lower his stress levels. He was quite distressed while waiting for his parents to pick him up from the precinct.” He explains, voice a little muffled in Hank’s shoulder. 

“You’re jealous a five year old got a hug from your dad and you didn’t?” Hank laughs as he pulls away, hands on Connor’s shoulders. “Is that it?”

“No.” He shakes his head. “Well, you’re correct that I felt jealous but more because you know how to embrace people to comfort them and I do not.”

“...So what am I? Hugging practice?” Hank cocks a brow again, expression bemused.

“My friends are other androids and I do not feel comfortable enough asking this of my colleagues as I am not as close with them as I am with my friends.” He explains matter of factly. “Humans are soft, androids are not. I do not want to accidentally harm a human when embracing them by applying too much pressure.”

Hank’s quiet for a moment before he laughs, shaking his head. “Alright alright I’ll be your hugging practice human.” Connor pauses for a moment before leaning in and wrapping his arms around him again. He’ll never tire of it, he discovers. 

* * *

Hank can’t remember the last time he was held. Well, the last time since Cole’s funeral that is. He’s always been the hugger because he’s big and has a knack for making people feel safe. Cole received countless hugs and he’d give him countless more if only life had been kinder to them both. Sometimes lost kids at the precinct need a comforting cuddle or two, and he’s held the newborns of his colleagues, even bounced them to settle them and rocked them to sleep when their young parent was run off their feet with a case. It’s different when it’s not a kid though, it means putting some polite distance between him and the other person. It’s reduced to a squeeze of a hand, a shoulder, a comforting pat on the back. It’s hard when they clearly need a hug but it’s not his place to offer one.

Is it any wonder he hasn’t been on the receiving end of an embrace in so long, not when he was pouring his career down the drain as he poured alcohol down his throat. It’s what he deserves, but at least there’s still Sumo at home. Poor dog deserves better though. 

Everything changes when he’s dragged kicking and screaming into a front row seat to the android revolution. At first the only feeling coursing through his veins is pure hatred that some clever pricks programmed an android to play pretend detective. It even buys him one for the road and the amusement wins over the anger, but only just. 

And then it’s not like that at all, it becomes a rollercoaster ride of emotions and he’s forced to check his prejudices at the door when the Android Sent By CyberLife behaves more like a human than some humans he’s had the displeasure of meeting. Connor is alive, Connor is brave and confused and torn between doing what he’s been ordered to, and deciding for himself. Hank realises he’s on the wrong side of history, and that needs to change. 

Connor remembers Cole. It’s what saves him from his doppelganger, and what saves Hank in a roundabout way. It’s what leads to him waiting outside the Chicken Feed at fuck-off o’clock in the morning when hell’s frozen over and he can’t feel his fingers. It’s what leads him to pulling that wonderfully alive young man into his arms and squeezing him close and feeling him tremble, feeling him fall apart as if the weight of the revolution has finally caught up.

Connor-the-Android-Sent-By-CyberLife becomes ‘just’ Connor, RK800 Assistive Unit, to Connor Anderson, to  _ Detective _ Connor Anderson. Hank loves him, this bright young man with an equally bright future ahead of him and enough sarcasm and wit to give Hank a headache trying to keep up. His house feels like a home at last and less like a tomb.

There’s something to be said, probably a lot of scientific journals and think-pieces and dissertations, about how the average American White Male is touch-starved as a result of toxic masculinity and homophobia. Hank can’t remember the last time he was held after Cole’s funeral but that changes after Connor decides he actually likes hugging and would like to hug people more. And that means practicing on Hank because Hank is, well, squishy in a way androids aren’t. And no he’s not about to admit aloud how it nearly shatters him when Connor wraps his arms around him at breakfast, that very first time he asks if it’s alright to do so. 

After that, with permission permanently granted, Connor starts to hug him in greeting and in parting, pairing it with good mornings and hellos and be safes and see you laters. At first he doesn’t apply more than gentle pressure, probably too scared to hurt Hank with his inhuman strength, but what he does do, always, is mush his cheek on Hank’s shoulder the way Hank had guided him to do that fateful morning after the revolution. It takes a lot of practice, mainly because Hank nitpicks his technique a lot, before he says Connor’s finally got the hang of it. Only on pain of death would he ever admit it’s really just because he hadn’t been held in so long and assumed he’d never be held ever again. 

Life can change in the blink of an eye, in a moment, an hour, a day, a week, a month. It has a predictably unpredictable way of keeping people on their toes and Hank goes from trying to come to terms with his late fatherhood, and then with his grief, and then with an android revolution, and then with his new family with his new android son- and then it’s one freezing February morning and he’s rescuing the brother of his android son, and then he has two sons. Two androids take on the Anderson surname. Hank thinks he’s really seen it all in his fifty-five years on this godforsaken earth, having survived 2020, but apparently not. ‘Rescuing the younger brother of your new android son from an illegal android cage fighting ring’ somehow tops ‘adopting an android as your son’ and it’s only been three months. 

Ronan is far more skittish than his older brother despite being built to be far more powerful. The boy could probably crush a car with his bare hands, not that he wants to. He even turned down a job with the DPD, of working with his brother and father, in favour of becoming an android first responder and trauma surgeon for both humans and androids. He chooses to use hands built for violence, to save and nurture instead. He gets a big hug for that, Hank makes sure of it.

This also means Hank becomes the human dummy for yet another android, so that’s more practice and more tutoring to perfect the highly coveted technique. There’s a little less joking this time, and no sarcasm at all because the boy’s lived through enough abuse, enough humans spouting lies that he can’t discern between things said in jest and outright disdain. There’s something joyful though, something that fills him with parental pride, when the younger android learns to reach out without fear of physical reprimand and seek affection.

He calls them kiddo, boy, son, and they’re somehow both grown men and young boys at the same time. They can run circles around him, physically and mentally, but emotionally all deviants are more like newborn foals wobbling around. Life stole Cole away from far too soon and he never got to see Cole grow and graduate and find his feet in the world. They’re not replacements for Cole, not by any means, but he’s always wanted to be a father, to raise children to be good and kind. In a way he’s been given a second chance- two of them, actually. 

* * *

The RK units do not need as much time to recharge as others, though Connor finds sleep is a fine indulgence. He rises from sleep mode at 5am because it’s nice to watch the sunrise from the living room. He expects to see Sumo rouse a little, grouse a little, before rolling over to sleep again. What he doesn’t expect to see is his father sitting at the kitchen table. 

There’s a small photo frame in his hands and Connor realises today is the 23rd of September; Cole Anderson’s birthday. Today would have been his tenth birthday. Connor lingers in the doorway, taking note of Hank’s hunched posture, the faraway look in his eyes, and the slow, tender way he’s rubbing his thumb over Cole’s face. He steps forward, keeping his steps heavy so as to alert the human of his presence before he slowly wraps his arms around his father from behind, resting his chin on the crook of his shoulder. Reaching out, he gently touches his fingers to the smudged glass as if tousling Cole’s hair.

“Happy birthday, Cole.” He keeps his voice soft and gentle. “You’ll be pleased to know dad actually got a haircut on time last Thursday. The mop is a thing of the past.”

Hank snorts, huffing a not-quite laugh as he elbows Connor. “You little shit.”

There’s movement behind them; Ronan getting ready to leave because today he’s rostered to work at Detroit Metro instead of Jericho and he’ll need time to travel. The younger RK brother joins them at the table, leaning down to embrace both his brother and father. He doesn’t use his voice often, but he knows it’s important to use it in times like these.

“Happy birthday Cole. Rest easy, we’ll take care of dad today.”

**Author's Note:**

> [I'm still on this hellsite.](https://archadianskies.tumblr.com/)   
> 


End file.
